A key week ahead in Brighton

Having been elected onto UNISON's delegation by the National Labour Link Committee I'm currently speeding on the train towards Brighton for this year's Labour Party Conference.

This is a really important conference given the economic circumstances on top of it being the last before a General Election.

For UNISON we will will be taking UNISON's Million Voices into the heart of the party and making sure we are heard. Our primary issue, and the contemporary issue UNISON has submitted to the Conference, is the public finances and how we can protect public spending and head off damaging and wasteful privatisation.

The mission for the delegation, as highlighted in Dave Prentis's speech to our National Delegate Conference in the same hall at the beginning of the summer, is to make sure that the Labour Party goes into the next election with policies our members can support.

TUC Congress so far

Well we've done a couple of days of TUC now. TUC's not known for controversy and there's only been two speeches against so far (one being a UCU speaker who spoke against the motion on high heals on the basis of what she's read in the Daily Mail rather than the motion!).

We seem to be saving the controversy for the end of the week, the likely flash points being Palestine (where the General Council didn't agree to a suggested more moderate statement), and political representation (which I'm sure will be the most reported).

Today we heard from PM Gordon Brown. Lots of the speech was good stuff, very much ticked the boxes. However as expected the word cuts appeared, and we need to make clear that 'back office' is vital for supporting the 'front line' to do our jobs. The PCS are also concerned about announcements which seemed to be targeted at the highest earning civil servants but would have a damaging effect on their lower paid members.

I have to say I'm not enjoying Congress as much as I have previously, though that's mainly because of the social scene being poorer than usual because of a combination of being in a different city and the recession (unions are a lot less inclined to splash out on free food and drink).

UNISON West Midlands are winners!

This great vid has been made by UNISON West Midlands and has won the TUC's competition. Congrats to the team involved!

Check it out